Staunton spectator. [volume] (Staunton, Va.) 1849-1896, 1887-08-17

miscreant class of people who, without an.
financial. liability, organize themselves int
what they call Life Insurance Company
with pretended capital of two hundred
thousand dollars or three hundred Thousand
dollars, then vote yourself into the lucrative
position, and then take all the premium
for yourself, and then, at the approach o
the State superintendent, drop all into th'
hands of those life insurance undertaken,
whose business it is to gather up the re
| mains of defunct organizations and bury
them in their own vault-then, say yor
had better get out of the business, and dis
gorge the widows house you have swallow
ed. But my word is to all those who are
! legitimately engaged in the business. You
ought to be better than other men, moi
| only because of the responsibilities that rest
upon you, but because the truth is ever
confronting you that your stay on earth is
uncertain, and your life matter of a few
days or years Do not those blackedged
letters that como into your Office make you
think? Does not the doctors certificates
on the death claim give you a thrill? Your
periodicals, your advertisements, and even
the lithography of policies warn you that
you are mortal. According to your own
showing the chances that you will die this
year are at least two per cent. Are you
prepared for the tremendous exigency? The
most condemned man il the judgment
day will be the unprepared life insurance
man, for the simple reason that his whole
business was connected with human exit,
and he cannot say: 81 did not think" His
whole business was to think on that one
thing. o, my brother, get insured for
eternity. In consideration of what Christ
has done in your behalf, have the indenture
this day made out, signed and sealed with
the red seal of the cross.
But have words of encouragement and
comfort for those of my hearers who are
engaged in the fire insurance business
You are ordained by God to stand between
us and the most raging elements of nature.
We are indebted to you for what the Ma
tional Board of Underwriters and the con-
vention of chiefs Of the Fire Department
have effected through your suggestions, and
through your encouragement. We are in
debted to you for what you have effected in
the construction of buildings, and the
change in the habits of our cities so that
by scientific principles orderly companies
extinguish the fire, instead of the old-time
riots which used to extinguish the citizens
And we are indebted to you for the SUCCESS
full demands you have made for the repeal
of unjust laws-for the battle you have
waged against incendiarism and arson-for
the fatal blow you have given to the theory
that corporations have no souls, by the
cheerfulness and promptitude with which
you have met losses, from which you might
have escaped through the technicality of
the law. 1 do not know any class of men
in our midst more high-toned and worthy
of confidence than these men, and yet I
have sometimes feared that while your
chief business IS to calculate about losses
on earthly property, you might without
sufficient thought go into that which, in
regard to your soul, in your own parlance
might be called sthazards, ,"s'extra hazards"
Especial hazards" An unforgiven sin in
the soul is more inflammable and explosive
than camphine or nitro -glycerine. However
the rates may be-yea, though the whole
earth were paid down to you in one solid
premium-you cannot afford to lose your
soul. Do not take that risk lest it be saii
hereafter that while in this world you had
keen business faculty, when you went out
of the world you went out everlastingly in
solvent. The scientific Hitchcocks, and
Sillimans, and Mitchells of the world have
united with the sacred writers to mako us
believe that there is coming a cont1agra-
ton, to sweep across the earth, compared
with which that of Chicago in 1871, and
that of Boston in 1872, and that of New
7 YOrk in 1885 were mere nOthipgs. Brook
lyn On fire ! New York on fire Charleston
on fire San Francisco on fire Canton on
fire st. Petersburg on fire Paris on fire
London on fire the Andes on fire the
Apprentices on fire the Himalayas on fire
What will be peculiar about the day will
be that the water with which we put out
great fires will itself take flame and the
and the Ohio, and the st. Law
renee. and Lake Erie, and the Atlantic and
the Pacific oceans, and tumbling Niagara
shall with red tongues lick the heavens
The geological heats of the centre of the
world will burn out toward the circumfer-
ence and the heats of the outside will bum
down from the circumference to the centre,
and this world will become not only accord
ing to the Bible, but according to science,
a living coal-the living coal afterward
into ashes, the lshes scattered
by the breath of the last hurricane, and all
that will be left of this glorious planet will
be the flakes of ashes fallen on outer worlds.
o ! on that day will you be fre-proof, or
will you be a total loss? Will you be res
cued or will you be consumed? When this
great cathedral of the world, with its pill
lars of rocks, and its pinnacles of noun
tains, and its cellar of golden mine, and its
upholstery of morning cloud, and its bap-
tismal font of the sea, shall blaze, will you
get out on the fire escape of the Lords de-
liveranee? o! on that day for which all
other days were made, may it be found
that these life insurance men had paid-up
policy, and these fire insurance men had
given them instead of the debris, of con-
sumed worldly estate, house not made
with hands, eternal in the heavens.